In wireless communications systems, wireless terminals (WTs) are paged, i.e., have special messages—so-called paging messages—sent to them, by associated base stations (BSs) to initiate communications. In order to realize this, the base stations typically have a channel on the downlink called the paging channel. In prior known paging arrangements, the paging channel is subdivided into a plurality of paging time slots. A group of wireless terminals is typically allocated a paging time slot of a prescribed periodicity for receiving paging messages from associated base stations. As shown in FIG. 1, wireless terminals 1 to N are allocated to time slot 1, wireless terminals N+1 to Y are allocated to time slot 2, and so on. Each wireless terminal is expected to monitor for paging messages from an associated base station during these paging time slots. To this end, the periodicity of the paging time slots is made sufficiently long that each of the wireless terminals can effectively turn off most of its circuitry between two of its designated paging time slots and, thus, save energy. This is referred to as the wireless terminal entering a so-called “sleep” mode. The wireless terminal, even though in the sleep mode, still has to keep track of the received paging time slots. The wireless terminal is caused to “wake up” prior to the arrival of its designated paging time slot, tunes to the downlink channel, and achieves carrier, timer and frame synchronization. Then, the wireless terminal decodes the paging time slot, and if its identifier is included in the wireless terminal's designated paging time slot, it knows that the paging message is meant for it. The wireless terminal then takes the appropriate action indicated in the paging message. If the paging message is not meant for the wireless terminal, it returns to the sleep mode, and monitors the next received paging time slot designated for it.
A disadvantage of this prior paging arrangement is that the wireless terminal has to decode the entire paging message in order to determine if the message is meant for it. When many wireless terminals share the paging time slot, it is quite likely that the paging message is not meant for that particular wireless terminal. This can cause the wireless terminal to expend power and reduce its battery life unnecessarily.